


A Lesson in Fear

by LadyTineapple



Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-10-25
Updated: 2012-10-25
Packaged: 2017-11-17 01:18:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,836
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/545925
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LadyTineapple/pseuds/LadyTineapple
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Everyone has always thought Sherlock Holmes' favourite holiday would be Halloween, as he enjoyed the most macabre things in life often mixed with a good dosis of fear. Yet, he could never be found anywhere on this particular day of the year.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Lesson in Fear

“So,” John asked, sitting down in his armchair without caring that he was probably interrupting Sherlock’s train of thought. “Any plans for Halloween?”

The younger shot him a questioning look. “Why would I participate in those childish festivities, which are not even celebrated accordingly?”

“I don’t know,” John said with a shrug. “Thought that would be right up your street. Blood, corpses, horrors of all kind… Isn’t that just what you want?”

“No,” Sherlock said, raising a brow at John and then returning to the thoughts that had occupied him previously. At least he tried to return to them, but the mentioning of Halloween kept interfering with his thoughts.

Under other circumstances, Sherlock might have enjoyed Halloween. Maybe not the masses of people demanding to get free candy from him or the screaming kids, but some of the horrors were indeed just what he wanted. The only problem was that Halloween held far greater horrors for Sherlock.

One of them had begun when he was seven. At that young age, Sherlock had already been smarter than most of his peers, though it had not been as obvious as it was now. What was obvious, was that he did not scare as easily. He even enjoyed things some people, even older than him, would have thought of as creepy.

For that matter, it had been incredibly difficult to scare him, just the slightest bit. Whoever tried, whether on Halloween or any other day, went home disappointed.

Most of the time, his family had felt relieved to see that Sherlock did not scare as easily as others. They were proud to have such a brave child, though sometimes it worried them slightly, since he did not seem to think about risks either.

Mycroft, who was old enough to feel protective of Sherlock, but young enough to understand his behaviour for the most part, loved to see others try and fail to scare his little brother. He loved how Sherlock rationalised their costumes and then mocked them for it. Most of the time, Mycroft felt incredibly proud of his brother and was glad to see that he did not need to be protected all the time and could very well care for himself.

That particular Halloween, however, Mycroft wanted to scare Sherlock a bit. He only wanted him to see what it felt like to be scared. He would scream a bit, see that none of it was real and then they would laugh it off together. It was simple. What was not so simple was to think of something that might actually scare Sherlock. 

All classical costumes, Vampires, Witches, Mummies and Zombies could be discarded easily. Even if they were good enough to seem absolutely real, there was no point; Sherlock already knew, sadly enough, that none of those creatures were real.

Yet, eventually, Mycroft found something that might give Sherlock at least a bit of a shiver. Even if only for a short moment, it would be more than anyone else had ever achieved with him.

He invited some of his friends – or people he called friends – to help him and they gladly joined in to scare some younger children.

They all gathered in an abandoned house, not too far away from the Holmes-household, dressed up in costumes. Sherlock had gotten an invitation to it, which, Mycroft was certain he would not be able to decline. He probably would not even have needed something that difficult. Telling Sherlock about the abandoned house would have been enough to set his adventurous mind up.

The young boy came alone to the house, seeming far too self-assured for a young child wandering around alone at night. Mycroft could not hide a smile when he thought how Sherlock’s mood would change in a bit, though it was almost a shame to break that self-assured smile.

Only ‘almost’ though. He had already learned that sometimes Sherlock was a bit too proud of himself. Just before Mycroft left that day, he had been bragging about how brave he was and that nobody could ever scare him.

Sherlock entered the house, not the slightest bit scared. Of course he understood that, if somebody sent him an invitation – and invitation on Halloween – somebody would be expecting him, probably in an attempt to scare him. He was sure they would not succeed, no matter who they were or how hard they tried.

The door behind him slammed shut, though nobody was around him. He rolled his eyes at that poor attempt to scare him; he had seen the wire on the door, reaching up to one of the upper windows long before he had entered. If that was all they had to offer, he thought, he might as well leave already and try to gather some candy instead, even though he found it to be a waste of time.

Calmly, he took a few steps through the room, examining it closely. The building really had been abandoned until that day, he noticed and realised that he would have preferred it that way. He would have liked to have a look around without someone bothering him.

For a while he wandered around, feeling almost bored. Slowly he began to wonder whether he preferred the trickster leaving him alone until he died of boredom or the poor attempts to scare him, which annoyed Sherlock to no end.

When he entered the upper floor, he heard voices, quietly speaking at the end of the hall. They sounded intentional, not like a whisper to change plans, but he decided to follow it, to find out what was going on.

He flung the door open and found a group of boys older than himself, sitting in a circle, chanting quietly. They were only light by candles. Sherlock quickly identified what they did as an attempt of satanic rituals, which he knew, was completely ridiculous and would not work.

“Good evening, Sherlock,” one of them said calmly and with a smirk and all of them turned their heads to him at the exact same time. “We have been expecting you.”

“You could have prepared something scarier then,” Sherlock said rolling his eyes.

“This is not about scaring you,” another explained softly. “We need you, Sherlock.”

“Your blood,” another continued, “to be more precise. We do not care much about you.”

Sherlock frowned, uncertain whether that was still part of their attempt to scare him or whether they had actually lost it, before he recognised a face among the group.

“Mycroft?” he asked disbelieving. “You could have thought of something better.”

“I certainly could have,” Mycroft said calmly, “if I had attempted to scare you, but that is not the plan. Did you not listen?”

Sherlock frowned and his brother laughed softly.

“Why do you think I have always protected you?” Mycroft asked. “Because I love you so much? Because you are so precious? Certainly not. I knew that we would need your blood.” 

“Then take your own,” Sherlock said, fighting down the feeling spreading in his stomach. “We have the same blood!”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” Mycroft said firmly. “It takes two for the ritual.”

Sherlock took a deep breath, trying to reason. “This is not even like you,” he then said. “You don’t believe in such rubbish.”

“Of course I had to let you think that,” Mycroft said smiling. “You might have ran away if you had known. Now,” his eyes wandered over his friends, “get him.”

Immediately, all of them stood up in one smooth motion. Sherlock’s heart skipped a beat and he suddenly felt the urge to run away. His brain told him that none of it could be real, that lunatics like that were not free to walk around and that, most of all, Mycroft would never do something like that to him. Mycroft did usually not even lie to him, but his body rebelled against his reason and demanded him to run for his own life, despite the shame it would bring if it was all a prank. He decided that his life was more important than his honour and, when they came closer, he began to run back down the hall, down the stairs and out the door, hearing some of the others laugh behind him.

The door opened easily and he thanked god for it. Once he had made it out the house, he thought he had made it, but he could not stop running. Not yet. When he was halfway across the front yard, a hand suddenly stretched out from under a pile of leaves and grabbed his leg, while an entire body jumped out from it, with white eyes, blue skin, blood dripping from his lips and screaming at Sherlock. Already feeling incredibly scared, he now fell and began to scream and cry, helplessly trying to fight the much older off. 

It took the others a moment to reach them, and when they finally did, they began laughing at Sherlock’s reaction. Only Mycroft could not really laugh about it. He pushed his friends aside and stepped over to Sherlock to see whether he was alright, while motioning the one who was still holding Sherlock’s leg to finally let go.

With shaking limbs, Sherlock tried to get up and run away, but he could not. Every time he had managed to get up a bit, he slipped again, making the boys behind him laugh even louder.

“Sherlock,” Mycroft said firmly, reaching for his little brother, who tried to push him away.

“Go away,” he screamed, his voice still shaking. Mycroft could see the horror in his eyes. Sherlock honestly still believed he was trying to kill him.

“It’s okay,” Mycroft assured him, grabbing Sherlock and pulling him close, despite the younger beating him, trying to fight his way out of his arms and screaming. “It was only a joke, I’m sorry,” he said quietly but firmly, trying to calm Sherlock down, but he did not listen.

Now, only some of Mycroft’s friends were still laughing. Most of them looked rather worried. Mycroft wanted to slap himself for his plan. It had been far too much. They should have ended it much earlier, when Sherlock only felt uncertain and slightly scared.

“Get my mother,” Mycroft hissed to one of his friends, after a while and he ran down the street. Of course she was upset and angry to find Mycroft did something so unusually stupid and childish, but for the moment she was more occupied to calm Sherlock down.

He had continued to cry for hours and only stopped after he had fallen asleep, due to exhaustion. Only then their mother found the time to scold Mycroft, which he had to admit, he deserved.

After that Halloween, Sherlock did not forgive or trust his brother for quite some time and sometimes Mycroft feels certain that even more than twenty years later he hasn’t. Sherlock also never participated in any Halloween-typical activities anymore. Usually, he went to bed early and avoided every possible contact with human beings.

**Author's Note:**

> Beta'd by Emma as usually. Hope you liked it and stuff.


End file.
